Teachers and Code-Breakers: The Latin Genesis Tradition, 430-800

That Genesis was a key text in the formation of the medieval intellectual world is well recognised. But what were the motives and methods of those who used it? This book looks at the writers and how they wrote about Genesis to reconstruct the intellectual history of the period. It explores how their use of Genesis discloses common attitudes to revelation, authority, and one another.In turn the book examines, how awareness of their self-understanding, can help in understanding their exegesis. Since they built on authorities and one another, and wished ‘to remain true’ to their authorities, how did exegesis change and develop? This study reveals a group who saw themselves as a single body dispersed over time, charged with a common task as ‘Christian Schoolmasters’, and who wished to retain all the had received, make it suitable for teaching their students, and ensure its continuance. The book explores the intellectual bonds between those we usually study (e.g. Augustine) and umpteen others whose often anonymous exegeses we tend to ignore - yet it was the cumulative impact of both that created medieval theology.